


From the Other Side

by FB Wickersham (perpetfic)



Series: The Blue Stones [6]
Category: Original Work
Genre: Female Lead, Gen, Magic, Supernatural - Freeform, The Blue Stones, gross magical creature description
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-12
Updated: 2017-08-12
Packaged: 2018-12-14 07:51:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,249
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11778651
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/perpetfic/pseuds/FB%20Wickersham
Summary: Lauren's settled in well to being Hazel's roommate. Not everyone could handle weird magic shit in an 10x16 room.





	From the Other Side

**Author's Note:**

> As always, love to HugeAlienPie for cleaning up my fast typing.

Lauren unlocked the door to her dorm room and walked in, stopping short at the sight of Hazel standing dead center in the room surrounded by a chalk circle and three pairs of shoes Lauren meant to put away two days ago. "What the fuck?" she asked as she closed the door behind her.

Hazel held up a finger. Her eyes were closed. She was breathing deliberately, and her hair was staticky, sticking out in every direction. That part, Lauren was used to. When Hazel used magic, it caused the air in the room to go dry and crackle. Lauren's own hair was already lifting up from her head. She didn't bother to smooth it out. 

Hazel opened her eyes, and they glowed brightly for a moment, the amber in the brown lighting up like a lantern. Lauren shied away. She'd never seen _that_ before.

"Sorry," Hazel said, and her voice sounded far away. She swallowed a few times, then scuffed the chalk circle with her slippered foot. The air in the room shifted back to normal, but there was still a dimming glow in Hazel's eyes. "I lost track of time."

"What were you doing?" Lauren moved to her side of the room and dropped her backpack on her bed. 

"It's been still the last couple of weeks. I was feeling out the energy."

Lauren picked up her three pairs of shoes and tossed them into her closet. When she turned back around, Hazel was pulling a bleach wipe from a container and using it to clean up the chalk. "What's it say?" Lauren asked. "The energy, I mean."

"There's an open spot." Hazel finished wiping up the chalk and stood. She tossed away the wipe. "It's not open-open. More like it's being held for something."

"Like it's reserved for something?" 

"Yeah." Hazel hopped onto her bed. The monster heads of her slippers bobbed like they were listening in. 

Lauren waited for her to elaborate, but she only swung her legs, the monster heads bobbing along. "Okay, I'm not one of you, you know. I don't know what reserved power does."

Hazel pulled a face. "Right. Sorry. You've accepted my whole thing so well, I forget sometimes."

Lauren couldn't hold back her proud grin. "Cool. Can I tell the internet you said that?"

"Sure." Hazel tipped her head back and ran her blue stone along its chain. "Reserved energy is complicated. Sometimes, it happens automatically. Other times, a person or a group pulls a section of energy into a sort of holding cell."

"Can you tell which is which?"

"Nope." Hazel looked at her whiteboard, which was divided into calendar days and filled with notes. "We're too far from Halloween or the winter holidays to explain a hold. Thanksgiving rarely has energy holds, and when I've felt them, they haven't felt like this."

Lauren wanted to ask why Thanksgiving would have energy holds in the first place. She wondered what piece of history Hazel knew from Auntie Lena that Lauren herself never learned in school. She filed the question away for later, when she and Hazel were idly bored and Hazel would take her many questions with warmth and good humor. "What's it feel like?"

Hazel thought for a moment, running her hands through her hair. It stuck up nearly on end, telling Lauren she was still covered in magical residue. "It's vaguely about money. There's a little taste of money."

"What does money magic taste like?"

"Pennies." Hazel laughed when Lauren stared in disbelief. "I know, right?"

"That is way too obvious. It should taste like, I don't know, fancy leather or something."

Hazel's grin widened. "Copper's been the most commonly used metal in money forever. I wish it would change. I hate the taste. It reminds me of blood."

Lauren winced in sympathy. She'd never seen Hazel in the midst of a Blue Stones issue, but she'd seen her come back to the room bruised and sometimes bloody. She preferred her Blue Stones status stay quiet, so Lauren started sparring with her as a cover. All the women on the floor thought it was hilarious how many "hits" Lauren got. The truth was, Lauren barely landed anything when they fought, but Hazel was teaching her a lot. 

"Money," Hazel muttered. She reached into thin air like she was pulling a book from a shelf, and when she pulled her arm back, she had her Blue Stones spellbook in her hand. Lauren had seen her do it dozens of times, but it never failed to make her catch her breath. 

Lauren flopped back on her bed as Hazel browsed her book. She checked her phone. Lizzy from poli sci was showing off her latest roller derby bruises on Instagram. One was shaped like a dick, and Lizzy was ecstatic. Lauren liked the picture and kept scrolling. 

She switched to tumblr as Hazel stayed quiet. Her dash hadn't updated much since that morning, so she tapped the search and looked up #bluestones. She was glad Hazel couldn't see her phone, though Hazel had told her she didn't find it weird that Lauren followed the tag. There were a few picture posts of actual blue stones people had found at beaches or in their driveways. Under those, there were some new posts Lauren hadn't seen. Blue Stones taking selfies. Blue Stones in training posting pictures of The House or their own bumps and bruises. A few dozen posts down, there was a photo of a chalk circle like Hazel had just cleaned off the floor. The caption under the photo read: _How to answer the question, 'Why the fuck is nothing happening?'._ Lauren stared at the caption for a moment, then turned to look at Hazel. "Hey, there's a Blue Stone on tumblr doing the same circle thing as you."

"Huh?" Hazel looked up and squinted when Lauren turned her phone. "What's the user name?"

"Blue Stone As Fuck. All one word."

Hazel grinned. "That'd be Mason." She picked up her phone from her pillow and unlocked the screen. Lauren watched her text. "If they're feeling the same emptiness, that's a big deal. They're in D.C."

"Wow. That's like, a thousand miles. That's pretty major, right? You two having the same issue?"

"Yeah. It's not localized, which means we probably have a group working together at various points to build up something big." 

"Is that bad?"

"Depends who it is. People using magic to help could be pulling energy now for something big coming up. It could be a group of gremlins putting together a New Year's prank. It might just be that we're both having rat-dragon infestations."

Lauren shuddered. Hazel had taken out a small family of rat-dragons in the laundry room at the dorm next door. She'd called Lauren when she'd found them and had Lauren read her the steps of the spell she needed to stop them. The illustration and description in Hazel's book had nearly caused Lauren to drop the book. Rat-dragons were basically shaped like wild rats, except three times the size, covered in scales, and with wings made of slime. They also spewed pus rather than breathing fire.

"Could it be anxiety beetles?" Lauren asked. "Or dust moths?"

Hazel grinned, reading her discomfort easily. "Sadly, no. They don't need nearly the amount of power that's getting pulled." She thought for a moment. "Maybe hell hounds, though."

Lauren groaned. "That's not better!"

Hazel laughed and shrugged as she went back to her book.

**Author's Note:**

> 1\. Rat-dragons are not the grossest thing a Blue Stone sees, but they are the grossest thing one sees on a semi-regular basis.
> 
> 2\. If anyone wanted to draw a rat-dragon, please do!
> 
> 3\. Blue Stones have a casual fandom. Mason's tumblr is one of the most popular because they post a lot of day-in-the-life stuff. Also, Mason has a cute dog that can sniff out weather gophers.
> 
> 4\. I just made up weather gophers, but I now know exactly what they do. ::scribbles info on list::


End file.
